Social Media Artist Spotlight

I had a last second request the other night to help shoot a social media promo for an artist friend, Daria Aksenova. The client was only expecting something shot on a phone, but since my new RED Komodo was sitting around, the video got a little upgrade.

Shot in 6K 16:9 sensor mode, 2K ProRes in portrait orientation, as this was specifically for an Instagram Story. I used my Sigma 18-35mm lens, mostly at the 35mm end. I monitored with the standard RWG-> Rec709 transform, but used the Panavision DXL LUT in Premiere and that's all the color grading I did other than slightly warming up the other shots to match the second. The first two shots are lit with just a single desk lamp and in the first picture I used my AAA pocket flashlight to shine on the foreground material to give it some bokeh. The other two shots were lit with a single Kino Select 30.

I recorded to ProRes as I haven't tested out the Komodo r3d workflow on my laptop and didn't have the time to lose if there were issues (under 3 hours from deciding to shoot the promo with no shot list to delivering the files - one 15 second cut and one 30 second cut). Fortunately it was only 4 shots and the client didn't want audio, as they wanted to add their own music. I'm used to shooting for exactly what I want (rather than "change it in post") so not having the added flexibility of r3d wasn't a huge deal for me.

If I had had more time to figure out what to shoot, I would have timed the last shot a little differently, but oh well. What can you do?

As for the Komodo, I tried using the autofocus feature for the shot seen in the second photo, keeping the pencil in focus as I pushed in. It didn't work very well as it kept hunting around. I'll admit, it is a fairly challenging autofocus situation. I ended up just locking my focus on my "b" mark and let the pencil come into focus as I pushed in. I think it worked better that way anyway than keeping the pencil sharp through the whole move.

I didn't exactly push the dynamic range too hard other than the first shot, with the dark foreground and shadow side while also having a sliver of bare lightbulb in the lamp visible. I think the highlight rolloff in that very bright part held up well, with no harsh clipping, considering I was exposing for the darker portion of the image. Most of my shoots over the past few years have been Alexa (Classic, Mini or Mini LF), so I was surprised that I could get a similar looking image out of the Komodo with very little effort. Again, I wasn't exactly pushing the sensor to the limits or anything, but it has a nice, organic feel and pleasing colors.

Would the Komodo be my first pick as an A-Cam for bigger productions? Maybe, maybe not. The extremely limited frame rates (very few off-speed options, even at lower frame rates) and limited aspect ratios straight from the camera (only 6K offers a 16:9 option right now and there is no anamorphic support yet) keep it fairly limited, though it's likely only a matter of time before more options get added. Once those are addressed, I don't see any reason why it's not a perfectly viable option for anything that doesn't need super-slow motion shots. If I need to overcrank a lot, I'd use something else. But the rest of the time? I think the Komodo will get the job done just fine.

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The Sword and the Pen featured on IDW Publishing website

With the comic book Usagi Yojimbo moving from Dark Horse Comics to IDW Publishing, I was asked if they could use my documentary on the IDW website as an introduction of Stan Sakai to their readers. I was happy to oblige and now it's being featured along with the announcement of the publisher change.

The Sword and the Pen completed

After editing the almost 6 hours of footage down to 13 minutes, I delivered the completed documentary last month. It is now playing for "The Art of Stan Sakai" exhibit at the Temecula Valley Museum, which runs through October 22nd. It was a real pleasure directing this documentary and I'm pleased with how it came out.

The Sword and the Pen documentary

It's been an extremely busy year and I just had the pleasure of directing a short documentary on famed comic book artist Stan Sakai. I've known Stan for several years now and have wanted to do a piece on him for some time. After watching tons of comic book creator interviews and documentaries, I was left underwhelmed by the lack of visual storytelling. It seemed that everything I watched used the same old, boring style of interview shooting that we're all too familiar with, so my pitch to Stan was to do something a little more visually compelling and cinematic.

We shot on the Alexa Classic using my Sony CineAlta prime lenses. To help give it that slightly softer, vintage look, we ran a Hollywood Black Magic 1/4 in front of the lens at all times. We used a combination of tripod and handheld shots to help give a visual energy. While the stills are from a very quick color look I built, it demonstrates the slightly warm and desaturated look I'm going for, with the desaturation being a subtle nod to the black and white nature of the comic book series, Usagi Yojimbo, that Sakai is known for.

Titan pickup day

I had scheduled a day to grab some location shots for my Titan teaser trailer and finally got some time this last week. My DP for the first day was on a job in Texas, so I shot this myself. Having sold off the RED Dragon I used on the first part, I opted for a Sony A7s with some old Olympus glass and an EF adaptor for this stuff. The lenses had some nice flare and I'm pretty happy with the organic edge they added to the Sony. The Sony was shot in Slog-2 (Picture Profile 7).

The plan had been to mount the A7s on a DJI Ronin M for some super smooth, match cut follow shots to contrast with the handheld nature of the spaceship footage. The Ronin, however, ended up having a major issue and wasn't smoothing out the shots. The Sony has major rolling shutter issues if trying to walk handheld, but I did my best to walk smoothly. It wasn't perfect, but for my no-budget trailer I'm shooting, the footage got the job done.

My friend Jim Zicree also came out with his DJI Phantom3 drone. With the sun going down, we knocked out a couple quick shots that ended up working well. We all wish we could have had a bit more time to play with the drone, but the Ronin gimbal issues at the beginning of the day ate up a lot of time and set us behind schedule. Fortunately, we got all the shots I was after and they're what I needed for this trailer.

Great aerial shot as the sun went down.

Sort-of-a-match-cut shot #1.

Sort-of-a-match-cut shot #2.

Sort-of-a-match-cut shot #3.

One more drone shot as the sunlight was dying.

A few more Titan shots

Here are a few more shots from the Titan teaser trailer. I have a rough cut assembled, but still have a few locations shots to grab. I'll be re-grading everything, as I just built an initial quick look to get a feel for it.

Titan teaser trailer

Yesterday, I had a change of pace and directed a teaser trailer as a proof of concept for a short film (though I have additional story elements already in place so I could easily turn it into a feature). My friend had built a set for another movie that I was set to shoot when the production suddenly shut down and the movie was canceled. Since the set was due to be dismantled at the end of this month, we thought it a shame it hadn't been used and decided to shoot a small project on it.

With little warning that we had access to the set before being taken down, this shoot was kind of a last minute thing, so rather than having auditions for casting, I went with some actor friends of mine that I knew would be great. I wrote a short trailer script based on an idea I've been tossing around for a while, and got my actors all on board. Then I spent this past week tracking down wardrobe, generating character breakdowns for the actors, and drawing up storyboards. Nick Forte, my usual 1st AC (and sometimes camera operator), does DP work as well and we get along great, so I brought him on to shoot this for me.

We had a good time, got some great footage, and even finished out the day early (just barely). I had sent Nick some reference screengrabs from Aliens and Prometheus as the look I was going for, kind of an old, run down look with pools of light, and he did a great job giving me the dark, oppressive lighting I wanted and he got it done with a two man crew and minimal G&E kit. When I wasn't busy working with the actors, I also pitched in a hand with lighting.

Shot on RED Dragon, 5.5K WS @ 6:1 compression. A set of T2 Sony CineAlta PL lenses let us make the most of the limited lighting available. Screenshots have a quick grade on them, but may not be the final look.